The Arkansaw traveler., 1887-09-24
THE TEXAS CARRIER BOY.
BY ALEx. swREr.

In most Texas towns the morning papers are delivered by mounted car rier boys. The residences of the sub scribers are too far apart to enable a pedestrian carrier to make the rounds of the morning papers before their contents have gradually crystallized into ancient history.
 In Texas towns the private resi- dences, owing to the largenesS of the state, arc not iammed up against each other so closely as an engaged couple taking buggy ride on lonely road. Moreover, pedestrianism ill Texas, so a Texas lrishman remarked, is con- fined for the most part to equestrians and people who ride in street cars.
 The carrier boy charges through the streets and around the suburbs with the calm delibcration of fugitive greenhorn whose scalp hangs loosely on the back of his neck, and who is being closely pursued by noble red man of the forest who wants to utii- ize it as mural decoration for his dusky wigwam.
 As the carrier boy approaches the residence ot subscriber, he emits q wall of agony similar to the ear pierc- ing yelp that oozes out of bench legged flee, whose tail has been crushed out of shape by being run over by the hind wheel of loaded furniture wagon.
 The carrier boy has an object in view when he initiates the cry of all untamed legislator from the far west, whose veracity has been impcached by brother solon. The object of the carrier boy is to notify the subscriber that he is coming, and his coming is like the coming of Jehu, the son of Nimshi, for he rideth furiously.
 With sudden jerk the boy reins in his ioaming steed-all Texas steeds know how to foam-at the front gate, and if he were any other than Texas boy, instead of throwing the paper into the yard, the youth himself would be projected over the fence with the force of Il steam wielded eat = apult
 The carrier boy has squeezed the moist morning journal into a hard lump of about the solidity of board ing house biscuit. and just as the drowsy subscriber opens the front door, the carrier boy hits him in the eye with the deadly missile, and laughs ficndish, mocking aueh, as he rides of. Instead of q single para graph striking the subscribers eye at q glance, the entire paper, patent medicine advertisements and all, strike his eye, a truly wonderful feat in journalism. which is unknown to the profession outside of Texas.
 Even as one star routcr differs from another star router in glory. even so does one Texas carrier boy differ from another Texas carrier boy in his mode of eXasperating the regular subscriber
 When the Sitter lived in san An tonic he knew carrier boy who took delight in throwing the morning paper up on the roof of the suh- scribcr's house, unbeknown to the latter, until all entire file for six months had accumulated in Inc gutter
 If the house of subscriber has Il front gallery. :he carrier boy will 0c- casionally, by way of variety, manage to hurl it underneath the floor, so that the subscriber, whose mouth is watering for late news, has to wait until he has hired little niggcr to crawl under the structure, or has hired a carpenter 10 remove the floor ing.
 In wet weather the little chcrub of a carrier does not squeeze the paper into a hard wad, as that might pre- serve its legibility, but he rides gently up 10 the front fence, opens the paper out, and turning it loose, allows it to futter down into mud puddle, which answers his purpose just as well as if it had lodged up in the fork of a pecan tree ninety feet from the ground, in some unorganized iron tier county.
 If the Texas carrier boy goes to heaven after some exasperated patron of the paper has taken him on the wing with shotgun, then heaven is not the kind of seaside resort if is represented to be in the published ad- vertiscments. - Ieras .Sifttags.